CHAPTER 2Authentically Open
Chapter 2: Authentically Open
Whether you realize it or not, you've been selling all your life. For decades you've convinced, persuaded, and influenced other people to make an exchange of some sort—increase your allowance, agree to a date, hire you for an internship, get staffed on that exciting new account. Any time you ask someone to give you their time, energy, attention, or money, you are selling. You've been honing your sales skills for a long time already; now, you need to turn them toward selling the work you've been delivering so well.
“Yes,” you might say, “but that's different. I don't know if I can sell my expertise. I'm just not a salesperson.” Rainmaking is itself an expertise. As the late K. Anders Ericsson, renowned professor of human performance, reminds us, “Consistently and overwhelmingly, the evidence showed that experts are always made, not born.”1 As an extension, rainmakers are always made, not born. Think about how much time and effort you've put into your chosen profession to get where you are today. Learning how to sell is certainly no harder than the technical expertise you have built. One of my colleagues is a former attorney. He routinely tells law firm partners he coaches, “I've been a lawyer and I've been a salesperson. Being a lawyer is harder. It takes more discipline, diligence, and more attention to detail. Between sales and lawyering, you're already doing the harder job.”
When it comes to rainmaking, though, our ...
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